Occupy Victoria kicks off with 1,000-strong march

People’s Assembly of Victoria gathers at Parliament Buildings

Like millions of people, I’ve been watching the Occupy Wall Street movement with interest.

Saturday, October 15 was billed as a Global Day Of Action. Protests against corporate greed took place around the world. Though my mobility is restricted by injury at the moment, I made my way down to the Occupy Victoria rally.

I stopped in at a gathering at the legislature. A group of tinfoil-hat types had set up a PA system, over which they earnestly warned of the NWO (New World Order), “chemtrails,” and, in case you hadn’t figured out the “real truth,” 9/11 was an inside job, engineered by Illuminati lizard people.

“Call us conspiracy theorists, if you like!” one man yelled into the microphone.

Out of respect for, shall we say, diversity of opinion, I listened for an hour, before heading, somewhat disconsolately, to Centennial Square, site of the planned occupation camp.

Within a block, it was clear that this was the larger demonstration. The diverse rally, filling the northbound lane of Government Street, was made up of youth, families with children, unionists, the local chapter of the Council of Canadians, environmental groups, and politicians from all levels of government.

More than a decade ago, I participated in what was labelled the “anti-globalization” movement. Those world-wide demonstrations protested the same issues, and were similarly accused of having no focus, even when 80,000 people clogged the streets of Quebec City, in April 2001, to oppose the undemocratic corporate power grab hiding within the proposed Free Trade Area of the Americas plan.

The punditocracy dismissed us as a bunch of weirdos without a coherent message. And what’s more, we smelled!

A chain-link “wall” around the delegates, 15,000 riot police, and record deployment of “less-lethal” chemical weapons kept the rabble out of the debate.

Last years’ Toronto G-20 protest was dealt with in a similar manner, and stands as the most overt display of state repression in Canada since the Great Depression.

Perhaps critics genuinely do not see the links between corporate influence and undemocratic trade agreements, food security, climate change, government corruption, and banking fraud.

But well-informed protestors have tired of explaining these issues to media outlets so blatantly conflicted by their corporate and class affiliations. They have—using social media tools—decided to “become the media.”

Through these channels, over the last decade, I have stated repeatedly that until the campaign against corporatism actually occupies public space and refuses to budge until real reforms are implemented, that the message will melt away at the end of each rally.

Authorities have learned how to manage fleeting parades. Everyone “has their say,” goes home, and everything remains as it was before. In fact, society slides ever closer to what Il Duce himself described as the perfect system.

“Fascism should more properly be called corporatism because it is the merger of state and corporate power.” ~Benito Mussolini

Pulitzer Prize-winning author and war correspondent Chris Hedges has eloquently  explained the grievances of the Occupy movement. As a recent guest on CBC television, he calmly endured crude insults from Canada’s Bill O’Reilly imitator, Kevin O’Leary.

In response, I was pleased to hear Hedges mention John Ralston Saul, the Canadian author who in his book Voltaire’s Bastards has most cogently laid out the historical roots and soulless “reasoning” of corporatism and its zombie “courtiers.”

Hedges’ point was, of course, to contrast O’Leary’s buffoonery with the intellect of a true defender of Canadian democracy (Saul’s wife, Adrienne Clarkson was the 26th Governor General of Canada 1999-2005) and a celebrated journalist with the CBC during its more dignified days).

Incidentally, that performance from O’Leary illustrated the depths to which the Mother Corp. has descended, chasing the bottom line into the gutter.

Perhaps its functionaries want to prove to the present government in Ottawa how far it can “balance” itself over the sewer of right-wing “shock journalism.”
(To the CBC’s credit, its ombudsman Kirk LaPointe has ruled that O’Leary’s insults violated the public broadcaster’s journalistic standards. No word if the star fire-breather of “Dragon’s Den” will be fired.)
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jQzq_WbH4E0[/youtube]

O’Leary-Hedges Exchange

Just as the anti-globalization protests began in Seattle*, in November 1999, then spread around the world, what began as a small Occupy Wall Street group squatting in New York’s Zuccotti Park, (responding to a call from Vancouver-based Adbusters Magazine), the Occupy movement has gone global.

While scholars, and a few economic commentators have come out in support, police repression has begun in cities like Denver, Boston, Chicago and New York itself, where the City and Canadian-owned Brookfield Properties, that ostensibly owns the property attached to Zuccotti Park, pulled back at the last moment from an eviction plan, over the weekend.
(*Resistance to corporate globalization actually began, if unnoticed by the North, in South American cities.)

Occupy Victoria Rally

By contrast, Victoria’s unimpeded romp was relatively light-hearted. In New York, protestors are corralled on sidewalks (by fences, pepper spray and flailing truncheons); in Victoria, police escorted the march through the downtown. A sit-in blocked a major intersection for more than half-an-hour without incident, before the crowd continued to the legislature.

The local evening TV news ran a fair report, concentrating on the issues—bank fraud, inequality, and corporate greed.

As I write this, on Sunday, the People’s Assembly of Victoria (Occupy Victoria) remains as a small group of tenters, surprised that they were not forcibly evicted this morning.

According to the Times Colonist, they have the blessing of Mayor Dean Fortin and are discussing strategy.

A recent tweet from the camp says: “Let’s create a river of supporters streaming through our square, talking, learning, making change. #occupyvictoria @OccupyCanada”

It would be a good idea, if I may offer advice, to stay focussed on the core issues and resist special interests who would hijack the movement to advance their own agenda.

There’s nothing more your detractors would like than to paint you as “nutbars.”

Afterword

Clearly, I believe that bicycles can be a big part of improving societies everywhere. I had an idea for a protest sign, but, in addition to physically interfering with my photography efforts, I feared muddying the main message.

Instead, I tweeted my slogan. Shortly, my iPhone began buzzing like a bee, as “mentions” rolled in, including a tweet from @GaryRidesBikes, who replied to agree and tell me “@OccupyLA has a bike share & co-op bike repair.”

Make the world better: #occupy a bicycle. #goodidea

— VeloWeb (@RandoRay) October 16, 2011

My message is the closest thing I’ve ever had to a viral tweet. Bicycles are still revolutionary.

Will OccupyCanada go viral? Unlike the CBC National’s star panel of pundits, I believe, over time, we might see a movement not unlike the one that spawned the On To Ottawa Trek of 1935.

Occupy Wall Street | Occupy Vancouver | Occupy Canada site

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Tagged as: bikes, ecology, economics, global warming, kirk lapointe, new york, protest, social media, victoria, victoria times colonist